erika roman killed in car crash

A popular Orlando radio DJ was killed Friday when she tried to avoid debris on Florida's Turnpike and her car ended upside down underwater about 20 miles south of Osceola County.

Erika Roman, a radio host in Power 95.3, in Orlando, has died. Roman died after a car
accident on Florida’s Turnpike. Roman met an accident at 1:30 pm on Friday, May 1.

A Florida Highway Patrol report says she was driving southbound on the Turnpike in the right-hand lane and swerved to the left to avoid a lounge chair in the road.

Erika Roman swerved her car to avoid some debris on the road. Reports said it was a boat lounge chair. It might have fallen from from a moving vehicle and got left behind in the middle of the road. Authorities are trying to determine the ownership of the chair.

Roman tried to avoid the debris and lost control of her car. She went over the safety guard rail. Roman was inside her car when it rolled down the embankment into the canal. Rescuers dove into the canal and brought Roman out of her car. They determined Roman was wearing her seat belt. Florida State Troopers performed CPR on Roman before she was sent to hospital. Roman died in hospital.

A Highway Patrol trooper and another motorist went into the water to rescue the car's lone occupant. The other motorist was injured in his rescue attempt and was taken to a hospital, but the trooper was able to pull Roman from the water. He performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation for 20 minutes, but was unable to revive her.

She was pronounced dead at Lawnwood Medical Center in Fort Pierce.

"Erika was a wonderful, passionate, caring person and she will be missed greatly by all of her friends and family.

"If determination had a face, it would look like Erika Roman. If passion had a voice, it would sound like Erika Roman. And if character had a touch, it would feel like Erika Roman."

According to the station's biography of Roman, she was born and raised in New York City and has been in the music business for more than a decade.

In her late teens, she was taken under the wings of New York entertainment impresario Sal Abbatiello of Fever Records. She promoted nightclubs for Fever Records while attending Marymount Manhattan College in New York, where she earned a bachelor's degree in communications and media. She also co-hosted a show on co-host on State University of New York at Stonybrook's popular college radio station.

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